COVID-19 Management in a UK NHS Foundation Trust with a High Consequence Infectious Diseases Centre: A Retrospective Analysis.

Recent large national and international cohorts describe the baseline characteristics and outcome of hospitalised patients with COVID-19, however there is limited granularity to these reports. We aimed to provide a detailed description of a UK COVID-19 cohort, focusing on management and outcome. We performed a retrospective single-centre analysis of clinical management and 28-day outcomes of consecutive adult inpatients with SARS-CoV-2 PCR-confirmed COVID-19 from 31 January to 16 April 2020 inclusive.

Asparagine and glutamine ladders promote cross-species prion conversion.

Prion transmission between species is governed in part by primary sequence similarity between the infectious prion aggregate, PrP, and the cellular prion protein of the host, PrP A puzzling feature of prion formation is that certain PrP sequences, such as that of bank vole, can be converted by a remarkably broad array of different mammalian prions, whereas others, such as rabbit, show robust resistance to cross-species prion conversion. To examine the structural determinants that confer susceptibility or resistance to prion conversion, we systematically tested over 40 PrP variants of susceptible and resistant PrP sequences in a prion conversion assay. Five key residue positions markedly impacted prion conversion, four of which were in steric zipper segments where side chains from amino acids tightly interdigitate in a dry interface.

Dual Shp2 and Pten Deficiencies Promote Non-alcoholic Steatohepatitis and Genesis of Liver Tumor-Initiating Cells.

The complexity of liver tumorigenesis is underscored by the recently observed anti-oncogenic effects of oncoproteins, although the mechanisms are unclear. Shp2/Ptpn11 is a proto-oncogene in hematopoietic cells and antagonizes the effect of tumor suppressor Pten in leukemogenesis. In contrast, we show here cooperative functions of Shp2 and Pten in suppressing hepatocarcinogenesis.

Cytoplasmic tyrosine phosphatase Shp2 coordinates hepatic regulation of bile acid and FGF15/19 signaling to repress bile acid synthesis.

Bile acid (BA) biosynthesis is tightly controlled by intrahepatic negative feedback signaling elicited by BA binding to farnesoid X receptor (FXR) and also by enterohepatic communication involving ileal BA reabsorption and FGF15/19 secretion. However, how these pathways are coordinated is poorly understood. We show here that nonreceptor tyrosine phosphatase Shp2 is a critical player that couples and regulates the intrahepatic and enterohepatic signals for repression of BA synthesis.

Computation-guided discovery of influenza endonuclease inhibitors.

Influenza is a global human health threat, and there is an immediate need for new antiviral therapies to circumvent the limitations of vaccination and current small molecule therapies. During viral transcription, influenza incorporates the 5'-end of the host cell's mRNA in a process that requires the influenza endonuclease. Based on recently published endonuclease crystalized structures, a three-dimensional pharmacophore was developed and used to virtually screen 450,000 compounds for influenza endonuclease inhibitors.